though the almost entire absence of trees presents a violent contrast
to the rich tropical vegetation of Singapore and Penang. On the other
hand, both on the mainland and in the island itself, there are bold,
rugged mountain outlines, often shrouded in a mist that reminds one
of Scotland and Ireland; huge boulders of rock from which beautiful
ferns of every variety (fifty-two species have been classed) grow in
profusion; a bay studded with wild barren islands; and to the east,
where the colony is only separated from the mainland by about a mile of
sea, the picturesque peninsula of Kowloon. The racecourse in the Happy
Valley is a lovely spot. It is surrounded by hills on three sides, and
from the fourth, which is close to the bay, one looks up a blue glen
such as Sir Walter Scott might have described. Here on the slope of
the hill is the cemetery, and here and at Government House there are
some trees, among which the graceful bamboo is conspicuous. But it is
the south-west of the island that is most affected by the residents. At
a place called Pok Fo Lum, about four miles off, several of the rich
merchants have built bungalows to which in summer-time, after stewing
all day in their offices, it is their wont to resort of an afternoon,
and let the fresh sea-breeze clear their brains of tea, opium, silk,
rises and falls, and such-like cobwebs. On a fine evening these gardens
are a very pleasant lounge. At the back rises the Peak, a fine bold
rock some 1700 feet high; all around are sweet-scented tropical flowers
teeming with strange, many-coloured insects and gorgeous butterflies;
while in front the view stretches to the mainland hills across the
brilliant sea rippling against little islands, and covered with
flotillas of native boats, peaceful enough to all appearance, but ever
ready for any little piece of light piracy that may turn up.
I was very anxious before leaving the south of China to see Canton,
and accordingly on the 28th April I started with a friend in one of
the huge house-steamers that ply between Hong-kong and Canton, and
are of themselves curiosities. They are divided into separate parts
for Europeans, Parsees, and natives of the poorer class, with loose
boxes into which bettermost Chinese families are put. You may form
some idea of their size when I tell you that three weeks ago, on the
occasion of a festival, our boat the _Kin Shan_ took up 2063 Chinamen
to Canton, whither they were bound to “chin-chin” the graves of their
ancestors. In all American steamers—and this is a Yankee venture—speed
is the great object, and we accomplished the distance, between 80 and
90 miles, under the six hours.
We had a bright sunny morning for our expedition, and the harbour of
Hong-kong appeared to great advantage, for there were plenty of fleecy
clouds in the sky throwing fantastic shadows over the hills around.
The sea was as calm and transparent as a lake, and we could sit in the
best cabin, which is a huge building on the forecastle, catching every
breath of air, and enjoying the scenery. The river-banks are at first
wild, barren, and hilly, like Hong-kong, but higher up there begin to
be signs of cultivation. Plantains and rice, which is the greenest
of all green grasses, grow in profusion among the snipe marshes.
Bamboos spring up close to the water’s edge, and the hills are lower,
less savage-looking, and more fruitful. Ruined forts, destroyed when
we forced our trade upon the unwilling Chinese, numberless boats and
junks, here and there a pagoda with different sorts of plants peeping
out of its many stories, tell us that we are drawing near a town, and
after about four hours and a half we reach Wampoa, a miserable place,
with about as dirty and degraded-looking a population as could be seen
anywhere. A few lime kilns, soy or ketchup factories, and dry docks
where ships are brought to have their keels cleaned of barnacles and
sea-muck, seem to constitute all the business of the place. I shall
always henceforth look upon soy as the essence of the dirt of Wampoa.
Canton itself does not present a very clean face to be washed by the
unsavoury river. If any one should come here expecting to see a fine
city of quays and palaces, he will be grievously disappointed. Myriads
of low dirty wooden houses, built almost in the very water itself,
are crowded together higgledy piggledy, without order or method. As if
these were not enough, there are whole streets, alleys, and quarters
of the foulest boat-houses, all swarming with human, and probably
other, life. Junks in numbers, carrying guns for defence, and if a safe
opportunity occurs, for offence, are moored in the stream. Strange,
grotesque craft they are, with their huge bows built to represent
the heads of sea-monsters; a great eye is painted on each side, for
the Chinese treat their ships as reasoning beings, and say, “S’pose
no got eye, no can see; s’pose no can see, no can walkee,” which is
unanswerable—even the _Kin Shan_ carries an eye on each paddle-box in
deference to this idea. But as at Hong-kong, the chief peculiarity of
the river scene here is the crowd of small boats with female crews. The
mother pulls the stroke oar, the aunt the bow, and grandmamma is at
the helm with a third. I am sure there must have been several hundreds
of these yellow ladies round the steamer at one time. The parrot-house
at the Zoological Gardens was silence itself by comparison, for hard
work, and strong pulling, have given them lungs of leather. They
all claim acquaintance, and employment on the strength of it. “My
boatee, my boatee, my no see you Cheena side long tim.” We had our
own boat, however, and with patience cleared a way and got to shore.
But no description of the Canton River would be complete without an
allusion to the famous “flower-boats.” Huge, unwieldy barges they
are, moored by the river-side, and tricked out with every paltry
decoration of cheap gilding, paper lanterns, and bizarre ornament that
the Owen Jones of China can invent. These are the temples of Venus.
The priestesses are mostly brown ugly little women in sad-coloured
garments, upon whose flat yellow faces the rosy paint looks even more
ghastly than on Europeans; some are almost pretty, however, and all
have beautiful hands and feet (when the latter have not been wantonly
deformed), indeed this is the one gift of beauty common to all the
Chinese, and the very men-servants who wait upon one have hands kept
delicately clean, and so well formed that many an European lady might
envy them; they have no need to wrap a napkin round their thumbs, nor
to wear white cotton gloves; their taper fingers and filbert nails are
pleasant to look upon. At night, when the lanterns are lighted, and
the tawdriness of the decorations is less offensive, the flower-boats
look gay enough, and they are one of the sights of Canton. The trade
that their denizens ply is not looked upon as disgraceful, nor does it
prevent their marrying respectably afterwards,—at least so it is said.
We had had an empty house placed at our disposal, and we took with
us a servant, a coolie, and a native cook. And this brings me to the
record of a feat. When we arrived at our house we found that the boy in
charge (a “boy,” like the boy in Oliver Twist, may be a very old man)
had gone off to “chin-chin” his ancestors’ graves, a ceremony which,
although our coming had been announced to him, could on no account be
deferred. So there we were at half-past three, without so much as a
scrap of fuel or a gridiron to put upon it. In spite of this we sat
down, four of us, at eight o’clock, to a dinner of mulligatawny soup,
soles, for which the river is famous, three _entrées_, a buffalo’s
hump, like boiled beef idealised, snipes, curried prawns, and a dessert
of plantains, oranges, rose apples, tasting just like rose leaves, and
dried lychees, the whole being decked out in the most excellent taste,
with a profusion of the sweetest scented and most brilliant flowers.
We had our wine with us, and altogether I never sat down to a better
dinner. Could any English servants, arriving at an empty house in
London, have done the same? The Chinese, when they have learnt to cook
after our fashion, are the best _chefs_ in the world. You see the art
requires delicacy of hand, plenty of imagination, and does not involve
a knowledge of perspective, so it just suits their talents.
I am afraid I can give you but a poor description of Canton; the
inventory is too large to be taken in a letter. Mr. Sala or any of the
professed literary appraisers would find matter for at least a chapter
in the bad smells. The streets are very narrow. Three men might walk
abreast in them, and perhaps you might throw in a boy if he was very
tiny indeed. On each side are small, low shops, which throw out such a
multitude of lanterns and perpendicular notices, like the attenuated
ghosts of many-coloured banners, that they look as if a solemn
procession in a pantomime had been changed by a tap of the harlequin’s
wand into a scene of streets and advertisements. As if the gangway
were not narrow enough, hucksters and costermongers, offering every
kind of goods for sale, hold their stalls on each available square foot
of pavement. There are meat stalls, fruit stalls, sweetmeat stalls,
sugar-cane stalls, fish stalls, and what can only be designated as
offal stalls. The yellowest crowd in the world hustles along pell-mell
at a furious rate, for every one is busy and every one is in a hurry.
Coolies carrying every conceivable burden balance-wise, from a load of
timber to a bundle of leeks, rush at one, and it needs a sharp look-out
to steer clear of their bamboo poles. Round the corner, lolling in
his chair, for all the world like one of those “magots” Frenchwomen
are so fond of, a Chinese dignitary is borne along, attended by five
or six policemen in white caps and red tassels, nearly upsetting a
small-footed lady, who has just time to totter out of the way on her
rickety legs. If there is a clear space, you may be sure there is a
doctor or fortune-teller peering into his patient’s mouth, like a groom
examining a horse’s teeth, or tapping his head mysteriously with a fan,
to the wonder of a small gaping circle. Barring in very rare instances
a dog or two—for the wary little beasts seem to know the danger that
they run of being turned into butchers’ meat if they stray out of their
own domain—no animals are to be seen. Beasts of burden are represented
by the men, and beasts of draught there are none; indeed, no carriage,
cart, or costermonger’s barrow could thread its way here. The amount
of industry to be seen in a single street is something surprising.
Carpenters, cobblers, turners, carvers—artisans, in short, of all
guilds, are toiling away for dear life—no one is idle. The butcher
is busy separating the coarser from the finer parts of the meat; the
fishmonger gutting his fish, and setting the entrails carefully on one
side—there is no part too vile or mean, none too dear and delicate to
find a customer. Chow-chow dogs (I saw such a pretty little puppy being
carried off to execution; he looked like a brown spitz, and I felt
inclined to buy his release), birds’ nests, rice-birds, the beccafichi
of China, and all manner of delicacies, are cheek-by-jowl with equally
numerous abominations, not to speak of rats and “such small deer.” The
greengrocers’ are the most tempting of the provision shops; they at
least show nothing offensive, and they make their fruit look to the
greatest advantage, setting oranges, apples, lychees, and vegetables in
curious patterns, while ropes of bananas, leeks, young lettuces, and
other greens hang from the ceiling. Competition is great, and with the
utmost labour it is hard to earn a living, for the two cities, Tartar
and Chinese, with their suburbs, hold an immense population, not to
speak of the thousands who are born, live, and die in the boats, and
have no part or share in the land until they come in for that property
six feet by three, which is the common inheritance. Altogether, taking
both sides of the river, there are probably a million and a half of
inhabitants, of whom not more than one hundred are Europeans.
Until the return of the English to Canton, it used to be a point of
honour with the Chinese at Hong-kong to try and persuade people that
the bombardment of 1856 had not done much damage. If they were asked
whether Yeh’s Palace or Yamên had been injured they would answer,
“Not too muchee; my hab hear they breakee that cup that saucer; that
alloo.” But the fact is that the city still bears the marks of the
punishment it received; considerable spaces have been laid waste by
fire; Yeh’s Yamên has been razed to the ground and its site “annexed”
by the French, who are building a cathedral and Jesuit college upon
it. Notwithstanding the havoc made by shot and shell, however, there
is much to be seen. The Yamêns of the Viceroy, the Governor, and
other high functionaries are standing. I only saw the outsides of
these palaces. They are all pretty much alike. An arched gateway,
with a colossal warrior painted in fresco on either side, faces a
blank wall, on which is drawn the outline of some fabulous monster,
and this appears to be used for notices and announcements; marble
kylins and grotesque beasts adorn the courtyard, which is crowded with
functionaries and dependants. The roofs are fretted into a thousand
quaint designs; but you are as familiar with their style as I am, and
as I shall probably in some future letter have an opportunity of saying
something about the interior of a Chinese officer’s palace, I had
better let the subject alone now.
Of course we went to see the “Temple of Punishments” and that of the
Five Hundred Saints, which last is one of the celebrities of China.
The former is so called from its containing models of all the various
modes which Chinese ingenuity has invented for torturing malefactors.
Guarding the portals are two colossal “josses” or idols, represented
with vermilion faces and a prodigious corpulency. Bits of paper, as
votive offerings, some with inscriptions, but more without, are pinned
or fastened to them by the pious: this is a Chinese method of showing
respect to the graves of their dead, and to their gods. Inside the gate
is a large courtyard, which we found crowded with people; all around
were little tables at which sat fortune-tellers, some young men, others
veterans with scanty beards and enormous tortoise-shell spectacles,
writing as solemnly as judges. Here in bamboo divisions are the dolls
which give the temple its name, and very horrible are the scenes which
they represent; beyond the courtyard is the real joss-house, from which
I carried away a confused idea of tinsel, artificial flowers, scraps of
paper, and gloom.
Far more interesting was the Temple of the Five Hundred Saints. In the
gateway, as in the former case, two josses of stupendous size mount
guard. One is represented as solacing himself with a tune on a kind of
mandoline; and I noticed that many of the scraps of paper with which
he has been “chin-chinned” were cut in the shape of his favourite
instrument. Without let or hindrance we wandered through a maze of
white-washed and neatly-kept cloisters, until we came to the refectory
(for there is a monastery attached to this temple), where we found the
monks at their afternoon meal. Just as we arrived, a tiny musical-toned
bell was sounded, at which signal the brethren rose, and what appeared
to be a short prayer or grace was recited in chorus, after which a
monk of higher rank, preceded by an attendant, left the hall, which
was a square room with long tables, and fenced off from the cloisters
at one end by a low bamboo railing. As soon as the great man was gone
the others fell to at their chopsticks and small bowls with renewed
vigour. The monks wear a long light gray robe, and they shave the whole
head, but in other respects their dress does not differ from that of
laymen. The temple itself is a large hall in which the five hundred,
placed in alleys at right angles, sit facing one another in all their
majesty. They are all of gilt metal or wood, and under life size, if
one may use such a term with regard to idols. They are represented in
every variety of attitude, occupation, and expression. Some are playing
on musical instruments, and are bland; others are evidently preaching,
and are didactic; others are inflicting punishment or doing battle, and
are very fierce; one is performing a difficult act of horsemanship on a
large kylin, while two smaller kylins are looking on in admiration—one
and all are made to look fat and comfortable, with huge paunches.
Before each is placed a small green porcelain pot filled with the ashes
of the joss-sticks which have been burnt in his honour. The monks were
uniformly civil to us, and neither here nor in the Temple of Horrors
was any fee asked or expected; how much better it would be if Europeans
would follow the example of these heathens, and not ask admission fees
in their cathedrals and churches.
You may well imagine that during a first visit to a great Chinese city
everything appeared strange and marvellous, but the greatest wonder of
all was that we should be able to wander hither and thither, intruding
into temples, thrusting our curious noses into every hole and corner,
like ferrets in a rabbit warren, elbowing our way unmolested through
crowds that a very few years ago would have mobbed and brick-batted at
least, and perhaps tortured and murdered by inches, any European that
ventured outside the factories. It seems almost a fatality that now
that the city is safe, and its inhabitants peacefully inclined, the
opening of the Yang-Tse-Chiang should have turned the European traffic
with the interior, of which Canton was formerly the headquarters, into
a new channel. The prosperity of Canton is evident, and very striking.
But it is a native and self-containing prosperity, and in no ways
dependent on Europe, and shows that the Chinese were quite right when
they asserted that they could do very well without us. Just before the
principal English firms withdrew their representatives from the city,
finding that the little business there was to do could be more cheaply
transacted by agents drawing a small percentage, an arrangement was
made with the local government whereby we became the lessees of a
small mud island, which had to be filled in at a great cost, called
Shah-Meen. This was to become the English quarter. The church and
new consular buildings have been erected there, and there are a few
empty bungalows belonging to merchants, but the place does not seem
likely ever to wear a look of great importance; the merchants see no
likelihood of an inducement to return, so Shah-Meen has so far been a
poor bargain.
Not far from Shah-Meen are the pleasure-gardens of a merchant named
Po-Ting-Qua. Terraces, summer-houses, stairs, drawbridges, carp-ponds,
rock-work, and flowers are thrown together most fantastically, exactly
like the gardens that the ladies and gentlemen on teacups and plates
walk about in. The doors are cut out of the walls in quaint shapes,
such as circles, jars, bottles, etc. As the rainy season has set in the
garden was not looking its best, but it was very pretty nevertheless,
although there was a little too much stagnant water about for our
ideas. Lord Bacon in his essay on gardens says: “For fountains they are
a great beauty and refreshment; but pools mar all and make the garden
unwholesome, and full of flies and frogs.” If this is true in England,
how much more does it apply to the East. Such things as flower-beds are
unknown here. The plants grow anyhow, without order or arrangement, but
they are carefully tended, and indeed the whole place was beautifully
kept, and there seemed to be a large staff of gardeners and carpenters,
who play a conspicuous part in a Chinese garden.
You will be wanting to hear about the curiosity shops. I went to
see them, but found nothing but rubbish at outrageous prices. The
Chinese buy up everything good at any price. The dealers carry round
their best things to the native connoisseurs, and put off any trash
upon chance customers, swearing that everything is “oloo and culew,”
old and curious. I bought one small bottle for a few shillings as a
souvenir of Canton, but even if I had had heaps of money, there was no
temptation to spend it. I found an old friend at Canton in the person
of Mr. R., our consul, who was a most amiable cicerone. He has passed
the chief part of his life in China, and is a great authority upon
all matters connected with our relations with the Chinese. He lives
in a fascinatingly picturesque Yamên with quite an extensive garden—a
curiosity in itself,—we spent most of the day together and met for
dinner, either at my quarters or in his beautiful Aladdin’s palace,
every evening.
We returned to Hong-kong on May Day. I found that the P. and O. Co. had
put on an extra steamer, to start on Thursday the 4th, so I determined
not to wait for the mail, but to start for Shanghai without delay. This
prevents me from making a trip to Macao, which is par excellence _the_
“outing” from Hong-kong. But as the rainy season has begun in earnest,
perhaps I do not lose much—at any rate, I shall leave my Hong-kong
friends with the utmost regret; their kindness and hospitality have
known no bounds.
LETTER II
SHANGHAI, _10th May 1865_.
The _Ganges_ did not leave Hong-kong until the 5th at noon, and we
anchored off the lightship in the estuary here on Monday night, but the
river is so difficult of navigation that we could not run into Shanghai
until the next morning. We had on the whole a fine passage and a very
quick one; C. and R., who were my companions at Canton, came on with
me, and the captain of the ship being a very well-read, gentlemanlike
man, sparing no pains to make every one comfortable, we had a very
cheery voyage. We had besides a young French artillery officer on his
way to revisit the scene of the campaign he had made in 1860, a few
nondescripts, two or three Chinese families, and a Parsee. Of course
the Chinamen pigged together separately, and his “odium theologicum”
forbade the Parsee to eat with us, which was a benefit to all parties,
for he was not a desirable companion by any means. The point of dirt
at which the Chinese passengers contrived to arrive during the voyage,
and the whiffs which came from their cabins when the doors were opened,
surpass belief; one of their great gentlemen here stood over the
French officer and myself as we were playing backgammon one day, and
manifested the utmost interest in the game, uttering exclamations at
every lucky throw, for the Chinese are gamblers to the backbone,—but
so noisome was he that we had to leave off playing and rush on deck
for fresh air. This being the condition of a “gentleman,” fancy how
pleasant the 110 coolie passengers under the forecastle were to sight
and smell. The Chinese ladies did not show at all, but they used to
send their dirty little brats up on deck to play, and very offensive
they contrived to make their small selves. Independently of their
dirt, Chinamen are a sorry spectacle on a journey—their heads require
shaving (a week’s crop looks even worse on the poll than on the chin),
and their tails get untidy and shaggy from being slept upon. Talking
of tails, it seems to be the “chic” at Shanghai to lengthen them
with white instead of black silk, which does not look near so well. I
noticed one man who, like little Cock Robin, had “tied up his tail with
a yard of blue bobbin.” (I found out afterwards that these white and
blue tails are signs of mourning.)
The voyage from Hong-kong to the north, being principally a coasting
affair, is not so dull and uneventful as more sea-going cruises. We
were constantly in sight of land—numberless headlands and islands
mark the course, but render it dangerous in bad weather. There are
plenty of ships to be seen, and all around the rocky islands the sea
is alive with fishing-smacks, their crews busily at work. We had no
mails on board, nor stern officers in charge, so the captain stopped
once and bought a quantity of fresh fish, delicious pomfret all alive
and kicking, paying the fishermen in kind with ship’s biscuit, which I
hope was as great a boon to them as their fish was to us. It is such a
fine sight in one of these narrow island passages, where one can almost
hear the sea dashing against the basaltic rocks on either side, to pass
a great sailing-ship close on our lee, and steam away from her at top
speed. Long before the estuary is reached, the sea, which in these
parts is of a deep aquamarine green, becomes clouded and discoloured.
This is owing to the immense volume of yellow dirty water which the
Yang-tse-kiang pours down. It is much the same colour as the Rhine, and
quite as foul-looking.
We began ascending the river soon after daybreak on Tuesday morning.
Its banks are low and flat. If it were not for a few trees there would
be nothing to relieve the eye from the monotony of the filthy water and
vast plain. Here and there a group of European houses and an ensign
or two mark a settlement. By eleven o’clock we had threaded our way
through the labyrinth of shipping and had reached Shanghai. I landed
at once and heard of an opportunity for Tientsing on Friday next, of
which I shall avail myself. By the way, I must tell you here, that so
far as I can learn, the communications between Tientsing and this place
are somewhat uncertain, so if any mail should not carry a letter to you
from me, do not pay me the compliment of being uneasy, but let no news
be good news.